EU cloud association CISPE calls for services to be made "Trump-proof"

The European cloud association CISPE (Cloud Infrastructure Service Providers in Europe) wants to drive forward the development of the open source project "Fulcrum" and is funding it with one million euros. Fulcrum is a cloud infrastructure management system designed to manage and monitor distributed cloud resources across multiple providers. CISPE wants to use it to enable an "open, sovereign and interoperable" cloud solution for the whole of Europe. According to the Github repository, Fulcrum is currently in "active development".

Step towards European cloud sovereignty

The Fulcrum project, version 2.0 of which is published under the Apache license, is intended to provide a scalable and competitive alternative to services from foreign players – especially hyperscalers. According to CISPE, many cloud customers are concerned that foreign governments have too much power to demand data, impose tariffs and arbitrarily restrict services on the cloud infrastructures they use.

Fulcrum is therefore being developed as a "Trump-proof" European alternative so that users are independent. With the CISPE-funded Fulcrum code, any cloud service provider that wants to integrate or use cloud resources from a pool can participate.

CISPE's demands

CISPE believes that EU procurement rules should be revised to prioritize European cloud offerings. If only 10 percent of European cloud procurement were to integrate Gaia-X labels, 20 billion euros could flow into the European cloud infrastructure every year, according to a press release.

European companies and institutions must be able to choose cloud solutions that can be operated in the EU in a legally compliant manner. According to CISPE, this requires not only a European-controlled cloud infrastructure, but also interoperable software stacks and networks "free from foreign control".

When asked whether Gaia-X has failed, a CISPE spokesperson explains: "We would not agree with this prediction. As a founder and current board member of Gaia-X, CISPE is convinced that the work of Gaia-X is an important foundation for Europe's sovereign cloud infrastructure."

CISPE recently integrated the Digital Clearing House and a service catalog into Gaia-X. The former is a platform on which, among other things, information about cloud service provider standards is available. The recently integrated service catalog, a collection of cloud services provided by CISPE members, is similar. Among other things, this should help with the comparability of cloud services.

"By using technologies to monitor compliance and federate cloud services that meet the requirements of the Gaia-X Trust Framework, including Level 2 and Level 3, Europe can turn its fragmented cloud landscape into a strength and create a competitive alternative to centralized offerings," the spokesperson is certain.

(mack)